Microsoft today released Windows 10 (19H1) Insider Preview build 18219 for Insiders in the Skip Ahead branch. Other than some changes to Narrator, there aren’t any big new features to report in today’s build, but there are plenty of fixes and other improvements that are included. Since this is the Skip Ahead build (and is the feature update set to be released next year), we probably won’t see any major new features for at least several weeks. And remember, there are still improvements coming to Insiders in the Fast ring. Most recently with RS5 build 17735.

Windows 10 19H1 Preview Build 18219

There is a list of new Narrator Improvements and changes in this build which include the following:

Reliability: We have made improvements in Narrator reliability.

Scan Mode: Reading and navigating while in Scan Mode has been improved. Selecting text in Scan Mode has also been improved. Selecting forward in Edge has some known issues that we are actively investigating.

QuickStart: The link in settings to relaunch the QuickStart should now reliably be working and will launch from the very first Welcome page. The QuickStart should also more reliably take focus when Narrator is launched, which means Narrator should start reading it automatically.

Providing Feedback: The keystroke to provide feedback has changed. The new keystroke is Narrator + Alt + F. This will work both in the Standard and Legacy layouts.

Note: The Legacy layout also allows you to use Narrator + E to send us feedback.

Move Next, Move Previous, and Change View: When changing Narrator’s view to either characters, words, lines or paragraphs the Read Current Item command will read the text of that specific view type more reliably.

Keyboard command changes: The keystroke to Move to beginning of text has changed to Narrator + B (was Narrator + Control + B), Move to end of text has changed to Narrator + E (was Narrator + Control + E).

Braille: Improved usage of Braille commanding when using the Narrator key from the braille display.

In addition to the Narrator Improvements listed above, here is a list of other changes and fixes in today’s release:

We fixed an issue resulting in Notepad’s “Search with Bing” feature searching for “10 10” instead of “10 + 10” if that was the search query. We also fixed an issue where accented characters would end up as question marks in the resulting search.

We fixed an issue where Ctrl + 0 to reset the zoom level in Notepad wouldn’t work if the 0 was typed from a keypad.

We fixed an issue resulting minimized apps having squished thumbnails in Task View.

We fixed an issue resulting in the tops of apps in tablet mode being clipped (i.e. missing pixels).

We fixed an issue where the taskbar would stay on top of full-screened apps if you had previously hovered over any grouped taskbar icon to bring up the extended list of previews, but then clicked elsewhere to dismiss it.

We fixed an issue where the icons in the Microsoft Edge extension pane were drawing unexpectedly close to the toggles.

We fixed an issue where Find on Page in Microsoft Edge would stop working for open PDFs once the PDF had been refreshed.

We fixed an issue where Ctrl-based keyboard shortcuts (like Ctrl + C, Ctrl + A) didn’t work in editable fields for PDFs opened in Microsoft Edge.

We fixed the issue where if the Narrator key is set to just Insert, sending a Narrator command from a braille display should now function as designed regardless if the Caps Lock key is a part of the Narrator key mapping.

We fixed the issue in Narrator’s automatic dialog reading where the title of the dialog is being spoken more than once.

We fixed the issue where Narrator won’t read combo boxes until Alt + down arrow is pressed.

Of course, with any preview builds there is a lengthy list of known issues for testers and developers in this build. Make sure to read the full Microsoft post for all changes, known issues, and workarounds.